Ashen Sky
by TSLOD
Summary: Zack Martin's senior year comes to a sudden end when Yellowstone Super Volcano erupts and puts the world into chaos. The choices he now makes are the choices that now could mean death or survival for the ones he loves.
1. Chapter 1

I woke up to the deafening beeping of my phone alarm. I groaned and rolled over and reached my phone and swiped it to shut it off. It was the first time in five weeks where I didn't have a morning Saturday shift at the Easy Squeezey but I had forgotten to shut of the 7am alarm. I closed my eyes and snuggled back into my pillow. After what felt like five minutes I heard a hard knock at my cabin door.  
'Zack wake up, if you want to visit New Orleans, you need to get this History paper done.'

My eyes shot open. Shit. I had arranged a tutoring session with Bailey. I wiped the sleep from my eyes and sat up.

'Yeah, just give me like, five minutes.' I said groggily. I heard her sigh and what sounded like a slight stamp of her foot. I instantly regretted asking Bailey to help me with my assignment but she was the only one who was willing to help me for free. Cody started asking for twenty dollars for each 30 minutes he had to tutor me, which was pretty much a 'stop asking me to do your assignments we're in senior year'.

I grabbed a crumpled shirt, which I suspected was clean off my floor and some jeans and quickly put them on. I brushed my teeth combed my hair down so it wasn't completely haywire after getting out of bed and then grabbed my history textbooks and backpack and walked out the door. Bailey wasn't impressed.

I smiled slightly at how easy it was for me to piss her off. 'Morning Bailey.'

'Whatever, lets just get this over with. You're already half an hour late.' She kicked her heels and started heading towards the elevator.

'Sorry, I kinda forgot.'

'I could tell. You know, 10:30 isn't really a hard time to wake up on a Saturday if you have a proper sleeping pattern.' Bailey continued to go on about proper dieting and 'benefiting your health and sleep' but I zoned out. She could be pretty annoying most of the time, so I didn't understand why her and Cody broke up. They were perfect for each other. My mind wondered to what Maya was doing and if she wanted to go out for dinner that night. Then I started wondering how I would pay for dinner as I spent my last fifty dollars on a game on my Steam account.  
'Zack, do you have it?'

I snapped out of my thoughts. 'Huh, what?'

Bailey put her hands on her cheeks and took in a deep breath. 'The readings and sources for the paper you're writing on?'

'Oh that! No.' I felt a little guilty about not being more prepared but studying wasn't exactly my strong point.

Bailey opened her cabin door and walked to her desk and grabbed some papers and handed them to me. 'I did a quick search on the Internet and got you some readings on an easy topic as I had a feeling this would happen.' She picked up a blue highlighter as I took a spot on the floor. She dropped it in my lap. 'Highlight the information that you think is important and then when you're finished we will go through it together and write up a plan for your paper.'  
I nodded. 'Sounds good.'

I looked at the titles on the pages and noticed it was on the Black Plague in the 14th century. I sighed. It was better then discussing the law and tax or whatever Ms Tutwiler was going on about in class.

* * *

After an hour of studying, Bailey turned around in her chair and faced me. 'How are you going?'

'I've read about one reading and I'm half way through the second one.' I replied.

'Really Zack? They are only five pages each!'

'With tiny font size!' I argued.

Bailey sighed. 'Well, I need to get ready to meet London. We're going into New Orleans today and there is this really amazing hat shop and I want to go check it out.'

'Bailey?'

'Yeah?'

'I don't care.'

I sat up onto my knees and began to put the papers into my backpack. 'Are you going to help me when you get back?'

Bailey snorted. 'No.'

'Why?'

'Because you're annoying.'

'I hardly said anything when I was here.'

'Or hardly studied.' Bailey countered. 'I only agreed to this if you actually took it seriously. Anyway, why don't you ask your brother for help?'

I zipped up my backpack. 'Because he started charging me.'

Bailey nodded. 'I would too if I had to do your homework all throughout school.'

'I just think it's greedy.' I muttered.

As I stood up a blood-curdling scream echoed outside. I looked at Bailey. 'What was that?'

Bailey shook her head slowly. 'I don't know.' She walked over to her door and opened it. Addison was standing in the corridor.

'Addison, are you okay?' Bailey asked as she rushed to her.

'That wasn't me.' Addison replied.

And that's when the booming stated.

* * *

**A/N: Hey guys, long time no see! This is yet another post apocalyptic story that popped into my head a few days ago. However, I haven't written in ages and first person isn't my strong point but here we are. **

**Please be gentle in the reviews, once I get back into the hang of writing again the quality should get better. **

**Hope you enjoyed and please review any constructive criticism or what not. Anything to improve is always welcome! :)**


	2. Chapter 2

We stood stunned in the middle of the girl's corridor. Bailey covered her ears as the mysterious booming intensified. I looked out the glass door to see if it could provide me with answers as to what the sound was, but the sky was blue and the ocean was calm.  
Then just as suddenly as it started, it stopped.

I had never been so confused in my life.

'What the hell was that?' Addison asked in awe.

I slowly shook my head. I was still looking out at the blue sky and calm ocean. 'I have no idea.'

Bailey lowered her hands from her ears. 'I've never been so scared in my life. And I've lived through an EF5 tornado.'

Crackling over the PA caused us to look at the ceiling. I looked at the white speaker box, praying that the boat wasn't going to sink. There was no way I was going to let my PS3 and laptop sink. Not today. Moseby's voice cracked over the PA which brought me back from my silent white male prayers.

'This is your ships manager, Marion Moseby speaking. I would like to reassure that all is well with the SS Tipton. As of this moment, no reports of damage to the ship have been noticed. However the SS Tipton crew and myself are unaware of the noise that we just witnessed. When we have been notified of the source of this mysterious sound I will make another announcement. I do advise however to stay on the ship unless it is an emergency and if you have family members or friends who are currently off deck in New Orleans, please contact them ASAP to alert them to come back to the ship. In saying this, there is no immediate danger that we know of. So please remain calm but alert. We will notify you when information comes in. Thank you.

I looked at Bailey who was slightly shaking. 'You okay?'  
She smiled slightly. 'Just a bit shaken up. That's all.'  
'Cool. Look, I'm going to go up to cabin and check on Cody and Woody. I'll see you guys at dinner.' I went back in to Bailey's room and picked up my backpack and headed for the elevator. As I pressed the 'up' button, I wondered if it was safe enough to use it. It dinged open and I was greeted with worried faces. I gave a nervous smile and walked in. I pressed my number and the doors closed.  
After an anxious 10 seconds I was off the elevator and in the boys corridor. I walked to my room, dumped my stuff and knocked on Cody and Woody's door.

A smiling Woody opened the door. 'Hey Zack!'  
'Why the hell are you smiling?' I asked as I walked in.  
'Cody was going to make me go to this history museum, but cause of the mysterious noise, we're not going anymore. God has saved me on this day.'  
I just shook my head at him and walked over to my hunched over brother at his desk.

'Do you know what it was?'

Cody sighed deeply then looked up at me. 'No clue. The Internet is not working and I don't have any service on my phone. Neither does Woody.'

I grabbed my phone out of my pocket and looked at the service bar. 'Shit, neither do I.'

'Does that mean what ever that sound was could be serious?' Woody asked. Cody looked back at him. 'I don't know. I hope not. I mean, it could of just been a meteor or something crashing down on earth, but we would have had a shock wave. Or maybe there was a shock wave that didn't reach this distance but knocked out the phone towers. Ugh I don't know.' Cody put is head on the desk and groaned. 'I just want the Internet back. I hate not knowing.'

'But do you know if it was something big?' I asked.  
'Well, I can't imagine something else making that much of a noise, unless, like, Yellowstone erupted or some shit.' Cody replied. 'But I highly doubt that. They would tell us weeks in advance.'  
I nodded and then flopped on to Cody's bed. 'All right, let's take bets. I can win some quick cash here for Maya and me, and personally I want to have a good dinner with my girlfriend. Woody, $20 bucks, what do you think it was?'  
Woody's eyes widened. 'Aliens!'  
'Ha, alright, $20 bucks for me right there.'  
Woody scowled.

'Cody?'

'Pfftt, I'll go with meteor.'  
'Mmm. I may have some competition there.'

'What do you think it is?' Cody asked.

'I'm gonna go with space junk. Do you know how much of that shit falls out of the sky each year? Dude, I'm surprised there hasn't been thousands upon thousands of deaths already.' I said. I leaned back onto Cody's bed and put my hands behind my head. 'Y'all are better off just giving me the $20's now.'

Cody scoffed. 'Whatever. You owe me $20 anyway, so I'll keep my money.'  
I sat up. 'Don't be rude. Pay your sweet older brother.' I made a puppy dogface.  
'No.'

'Little shit.' I laid back down. 'Well whatever it was I just hope Moseby tells us soon.'

After 2 hours of distracting ourselves with video games and what not, the PA finally crackled again. A generic beeping attention tone followed after. Cody paused the game and we looked at the tiny speaker that is installed in the rooms.

'Ladies and gentleman, this is the ships manager, Marion Moseby. I have been informed of what the noise was earlier in the day. However please be warned that the news that follows may create panic on board the ship but I beg you to please follow orders and to try and keep the level of panic to a minimum.'

I stared at the speaker. 'Shit this really can't be good.' 

* * *

**A/N: Well, here it is. Please don't forget to review my lovelys! ^_^  
**


End file.
